He caught our line, we secured the boat, and dropped the gangplank over across the brush and there we were where we would be spending the night that night. In the middle of nowhere, between two towns, on the day of the strike. J called the local tourist info office to ask about the situation and the lady confirmed, "Oh yes, there is a strike. In fact I am filling in for the person who is on strike right now today." Ha
There were two big concerns for us about this whole thing. One, we wanted to get to the next big town down the river called Auxerre, which was pretty good size, and had a large open air market happening there this day. We were hoping to shop for several days in that town, and it is supposed to be really scenic.
It became clear that was not going to happen.
Two, we were supposed to clear about 11 or 12 locks on this "travel day" which would generally keep us "on schedule" for our overall trip. We had a certain amount of kilometers and locks we needed to clear on each day to keep up with being in the drop point by the end of the week.
We were caught offguard by the whole strike thing. The fact that on Tuesday ( this day) was market day in Auxerre and it is open only from 8am to Noon and we were not going to make it there in time to shop for our supplies was a dissappointment to us.
But Bassou, the man keeping this lock was so nice, and kind. He was friendly, and told us he'd call a cab for us to take us into Auxerre, to do our shopping and he would keep an eye on our boat for us while we were gone. We happily took him up on that offer. He was so generous and patient with our crappy French (well mine) I asked what kind of wine he liked to drink. I was thinking anyone can drop him a few Euros for a tip for helping us, but knowing we were going shopping, I wanted to bring him a bottle of wine for a thank you. So I asked what he liked to drink. He seemed surprised, and not understand the question. So I asked again, "White or Red wine for you?" He looked at me and smiled, " white wine is for women." Ha
We all laughed, and went by taxi to town. We shopped for over an hour at the grocery store, having missed the market (dam it) but got what we needed. Then had to wait for over an hour because the taxi drivers were backed up because they were ON STRIKE so we waited and waited and finally got a ride back to the boat.
Bassou was so surprised and appreciative for the bottle of bordeaux. It was clear by the look on his face. Then G asked if he had any fresh Rosemary in his garden ( he saw it as we locked through) Bassou smiled and said yes, and also gave us a bag FULL of fresh tomatoes from his personally manicured arden.
Gerald asked him if he liked his job? His response was a big smile... " I love my job, it is the best job in the world." They only work 6 months out of the year. Closed in the winter. They are provided housing, ( the lockkeppers house) and they get full govt benefits. He had had this job for 30 years.
He was all smiles. And very kind to us.
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